Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular Music

AVERY, Teodross

(b 2 July 1973, CA) Tenor saxophone. With Joshua Redman, Roy Hargrove and a few others, one of a new generation of jazzmen who are far enough away from the giants of the past to admire and respect them without being overawed, and may be able to find their own voices, advancing the tradition without being imprisoned in it. 'I want to draw from tradition because I know that if I have a deep understanding of it, what I do in the future will be stronger. But you can't go on imitating the Forties in the Nineties' (interview with Martin Gayford in the Daily Telegraph). He haunted jazz clubs in the San Francisco area, asking to sit in; he played with Art Blakey, Elvin Jones and Wynton Marsalis (who bought him a new saxophone). In Other Words '94 on GRP/Impulse by the Teodross Avery Quartet came out when he was 21 years old; My Generation '95 incl. John Scofield.